


from give and take and still somehow

by lostinsanity



Category: One Direction
Genre: Alcoholism, Depression, M/M, Self Harm, Self Loathing, broken!louis, depressed!louis
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-12-15
Updated: 2012-12-15
Packaged: 2017-11-21 04:21:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/593391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostinsanity/pseuds/lostinsanity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And he'd let them all fucking down because he couldn’t fix this. This was something too big for him, this wasn’t putting a band aid on a skinned knee or beating up that kid that hit Lottie or rubbing his mum's shoulders after a long day at work, this was huge, this was the whole of fucking society and no matter how hard he tried or what he said or how hard he wished, he couldn’t change the world and its attitude.</p>
            </blockquote>





	from give and take and still somehow

**Author's Note:**

> AO3-less Courtney, aka my pride and joy, my jesus, helped me with this, in fact she wrote a good part of it. I love her with my entirety and every fiber of my being even if all we do is kill ourselves with feels, she is my rock.

They promised. They _fucking_ promised. They told him that they’d never do this to Harry, never put him through this. Never force him to be someone he wasn’t. Never force Harry to go in the front door of her hotel, sneak out the back, sleep curled up to him, sneak back in so early the sun wasn’t up, and come out the front. They promised. And they broke that fucking promise.

Louis even knew the exact day they broke it, too. They’d been talking about hooking Harry up with Taylor for a while now, but after her whole shindig with Ed, it had toned down a bit, and Louis thought it was over. But then, suddenly, Harry was telling people in interviews that Taylor was his celebrity crush and the X Factor rumour and the stroll in Central Park with Lux just did it all for him. Louis was about to snap.

He had done all he could to protect Harry, his Harry. He’d taken the beard, he’d taken the reputation as an asshole, he’d given them his Twitter password, let them log on. He’d done it all. Louis had let them walk all over him, pushing Harry back behind a screen of protection, shielding him with himself. Louis didn’t want Harry to be put through this. He knew Harry hated lies. He could barely handle this as it was. But now, it was all lost. It was a lost fucking cause. All his effort, all his blood and sweat and tears, so many tears to protect Harry had been for nothing. 

~

He could act. Everyone knew that. Everyone knew he’d wanted to pursue drama if he’d never gotten into the band. Yet nobody could see past him, not even when things were bad. He’d just plaster on a stupid smile and wink and say ‘hey babe’ and there would be screaming girls all around him and it was that easy, just that easy. It shouldn’t have been that easy. He was sick of it being easy. He wanted someone to notice, he always had. And he just didn’t have the strength to keep it up anymore.

And so, MSG rolled around. Madison Square Garden, the performance of his dreams. Of all of their dreams.  Louis was psyched, of course. But all the talk of Taylor and photos with Harry and everyone screaming at him and Eleanor following him and all of the usual shit and he just couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t hold her hand. He couldn’t keep up the act. After the show is done, the actor should file away his script and wipe off his makeup and sleep. Louis hadn’t done that, he couldn’t. And now, it was about time he did.

He didn’t hold her hand this time. He pulled away. That emotionless smile he always wore while with her was gone. He was laid out bare; his bones set to dry beneath the sun and the criticism and everything. He was done pretending. He was sick of the lies and his head throbbing and everything, everything. He was just sick of it.

He stopped pretending, he stopped putting in an effort to make it seem as though he was enjoying Eleanor’s company. And the small smile Harry gave him that night was worth so much more than the glares on the faces of management, and worth so much less than the truth. 

Actors were good liars. Liars were good actors. Louis was an actor, which made him a liar. And he hated being a liar.

~

He knew he wasn’t supposed to be drinking alone. He wasn’t supposed to be drinking at all, in fact, but they all were, so it didn’t matter. But the moment Louis tucked himself into a corner with just a bottle of hard vodka and his thoughts, he couldn’t stop. Drinking alone was reserved for when you were depressed, when you wanted to drown yourself in alcohol and just stop thinking about everything. Louis didn’t like to think that he was that far gone, but, apparently, he was. He just wanted someone to notice. That’s all. He only wanted someone to notice him and the pain in his eyes. Someone other than Harry, because Harry had the same pain, Harry had the same goddamn situation and neither of them could do anything about it. They’d cried, they’d cried a lot and it had solved nothing except to accept the awfulness of their reality. Their reality should have been a dream; they were living the dream. And yet somehow that was slowly being twisted into a nightmare, and Louis had no idea how to stop it. They both had defeat in their eyes because they’d fought and it hadn’t been enough, nothing would be enough and Louis would give anything, trade anything, give up the fame and the money and the cars just to see Harry's eyes bright and clear and untroubled and 16 again but he couldn’t. They were adults now, hardened by real life and society and the pressure of fame and Harry's eyes were too similar to his. Sad. Angry. Beaten.

And with each swallow, the vodka burned his throat and numbed his brain. By the end of the night he could barely stand upright and was screaming obscenities at people and wasn’t making any sense. Eleanor brought him up to his room and laid him down on the bed, watching him pitifully as he crawled under the covers and just began to sob.

~

When he came to, the sun was bright and blinding through the window, his eyes and his throat burned and he was two hours late to rehearsal. His head still swam drunkenly and he didn't care. He was surrounded by a warm, familiar, cinnamon scent and opened his eyes to Harry's hotel bed. He didn't know how he'd gotten there and figured he'd stumbled, drunk and crying to Harry's room after Eleanor had left. Harry's empty room. The pillow was damp beneath his cheek. His chest ached and his head was starting to pound even as he felt the dull numbness of alcohol still fizzing through his veins. He threw an arm over his eyes, blocking out the sun and the world and every goddamn thing in it, rolling over and burying his nose deep in the sheets that smelled like Harry. He let out no tears, and he lay there, breathing in the scent of Harry until his phone rung and angry voices demanded he be at rehearsal.

~

It was almost worse now, because there was someone to blame. Before, even a year ago, when Eleanor was signed there was less hype, less media buzz surrounding them. Now, the media is huge. They're in the tabloids, the trashy magazines. He can blame Taylor though. There was no father pressuring her into this deal, no management making the arrangements. This was Taylor and their management, she was the one agreeing and making arrangements for publicity and for attention. He had someone to hate this time, someone he could be angry at that didn't literally own them, someone he could loathe with everything he had. He hated management with every cell in his body but they owned him, they owned the band and their future and their success. Taylor didn’t own him, Taylor fucking Swift was nothing to him, nothing but another facet of their oppression, another face in the way of him and Harry and the truth, another component to their nightmare, and oh, how he hated her. But he couldn't show it. He had to grin and wink and nudge Harry when her name came up, had to smile through the hatred burning in his veins. He was specifically told by management to look happy and cheerful and not as though he was thinking of somehow murdering America’s Princess when her name came up and the jealousy and rage in his bones felt like it was physically burning him.

~

He was angry all the time now, the rage was simmering beneath his skin and searing in his veins because it wasn't fucking fair, it wasn't fair at all and he wished he could change it. He couldn't. There was nothing they could do or say to change this and it infuriated him. He was brought up with the belief that if you wanted something, you had to fight for it. That there was no problem you couldn’t fix. He was the hero of his family, he was the perfect son, the big brother that fixed everything. The girls all looked up to him, had from an early age. They knew that no matter what was wrong, Louis or Jay could fix it. They believed in him and his ability to fix things and so had Jay and so had Harry and he'd let them all fucking down because he couldn’t fix this. This was something too big for him, this wasn’t putting a band aid on a skinned knee or beating up that kid that hit Lottie or rubbing his mum's shoulders after a long day at work, this was huge, this was the whole of fucking society and no matter how hard he tried or what he said or how hard he wished, he couldn’t change the world and its attitude. He had tried fighting, and he'd been crushed at every turn. And there was nothing left to try. Harry had believed in him so much that he'd almost believed in himself, and that made it hurt so much more when he realised he couldn’t change this. It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t right and it went against every single instinct of ingrained personal justice in Louis’ body, but he couldn’t change it.

~

He was worried, he was scared, terrified because Harry begged him, Harry pled to be the one with a beard for a while, to be the strong one for a while but Harry wasn't as strong as he thought he was. It wasn't easy, Louis knew. He knew how hard it was, how much it took from you, how much it weighed on you. And he was terrified that the pressure would break Harry because it had nearly broken him. He had a thick skin, he developed one early, and Harry just didn’t have that. He was so open, so easy, so loving and Louis loved that about him. But it terrified him, because that openness, that trust in everyone and everything, that calm, naïve belief that the world was fair and everyone was kind was exactly what was going to get Harry hurt. Because the world wasn’t fucking fair, and he desperately wanted Harry to keep that innocence, the shroud of naivety that allowed him to be so in love with Louis and so in love with the idea of everyone knowing.

~

He'd done all this, he'd been through it all, the fake smiles and the awkward hand holding. The stilted talk between two people that had nothing in common except the fact they both had to make this look convincing. He knew Eleanor had been pushed into it by her father, shunted into a job she didn’t really want because her father had smelled opportunity and she went along with it because she wanted her name out there and she thought she was doing a scared gay man who wasn’t ready to come out of the closet a favour. That’s not to say she didn’t agree to become a beard for selfish reasons too, but as much as Louis and Harry hadn’t liked her, they understood now that she was a good person. Louis didn’t know what Taylor was in this for though. He had thought she was in it for attention, publicity, a convenient scapegoat to base a new album on, a date to all her awards shows. But there was something in her eyes when she looked at Louis, a challenge almost that made him wonder if maybe she was hoping to claim Harry in reality too. And as laughable as that idea was, Louis couldn’t help but worry. Because Eleanor knew, she understood that there was as much chance of actually dating Louis as there was of the sun exploding and she had quickly given up the small crush she had and become somewhat of a friend to Louis. But Taylor didn’t, and if Taylor thought there was some chance then she was going to be a whole lot worse to live through than Eleanor. Experience was a brutal teacher, but you learned, oh god, you learned, Louis had learned everything about this industry and the business and how Harry was feeling. He knew exactly what Harry was going through, he knew how to stroke his back and his curls when Harry cried into his shoulder, he knew exactly when to speak and when to be silent. When to offer comfort and when to say nothing. And that made it easier but it fuelled Louis' anger because they shouldn't have to make anything easier. They shouldn't have to deal with it, they shouldn't have to live in a situation like this but they did and they dealt with it every day and it beat them down and Louis wondered when it was going to win.

~

Harry had told him he'd had his turn, paid his dues, done his time. It was Harry’s turn now. Louis refused to accept it until the deal was made and hands were shaken and Harry styles was confirmed to be dating Taylor swift. And he hated her. He loathed her with a burning passion in a way he'd never hated Eleanor because Eleanor was forced into it by her father just as much as they had been by their management. She had been genuinely apologetic, genuinely lovely. It was her job, she didn't know what she was getting into, she had no idea of the fame or the scrutiny or the criticism that would come her way. But Taylor, she was different. She knew exactly what was happening, exactly what he was getting into, she knew exactly who she was hurting and exactly how to smile sweetly into the cameras while doing it. And it burned in Louis' veins each time he spoke with her, and he hated her and he hated management and he drank bitterly and alone.

~

Management sat them down and told them about what was going to happen and dates and times for outings and Louis clenched Harry's hand under the desk like a lifeline. White knuckles and trembling fingers, Louis and Harry nodded in all the right places and agreed when they needed to and hated every minute of it. Every word of managements was infused with the warning that if they didn't do exactly what was said then their careers and their lives were down the drain and Louis clenched his teeth angrily. It was Taylor that made him see red. Sitting on the other side of the sterile office table, with a smug little smirk like she thought that despite the fact that Louis and Harry were more permanently in each other’s hearts and lives than the others words inked into their skin she could win him away from Louis. His hand clutched Harry's tighter, possessively and when the meeting was declared over he stood up stiffly and dragged Harry away from the poisonous room. He kissed him fiercely and possessively and angrily and he kissed his worry and his fear and his anger into him and their kisses started fierce but Harry steered them to gentleness and love and Louis thought that maybe it really was Harry who was the strong one.

 

~

He was sick to death of the poison and the vitriol and the lies and he knew Harry had done this for him, for them but it just felt like now there were twice as many lies and management hadn't even mentioned the possibility of Eleanor leaving. He felt as though they were drowning, they were kids in an adult’s world and they didn't know the rules or the game that everyone else was playing. Taylor knew, knew all the right things to say and when to smile and when to agree and when to nod and Harry and Louis sat there, completely out of control and shunted along and hating every minute of it. 

It was when Liam said to them that "at least she seems nice" that he realized Taylor's blonde hair and blue eyes and sickly sweet smile had fooled everyone and he and Harry were alone. And Liam and Niall and Zayn knew, they knew how desperately, madly, crazily in love with each other they were, they knew how angry and frustrated and sick of lying and hiding and pretending Harry and Louis were, but somehow they just didn’t understand how heavily it weighed on them, how it made Louis feel to constantly be lying and acting. It was exhausting, it was tiring and he was so angry, all the time. He was done. He was finished.

~

He felt as though he could scream and punch and kick and it wouldn't make the slightest bit of difference. They were treated as children, as petulant toddlers, a problem to fix. They were looked over through disapproving eyes and they were followed by sighs. Louis wasn't under any impression that they were worth anything more than the money they could make and knew that a lot of their management considered them too much trouble to deal with. 

The world was spinning crazily and if Louis didn’t Harry's hand to grab, Harry’s lips to kiss and Harry’s heart to hold he was sure he would have been flung off long ago. He understood fully now, more completely and depressingly than ever before the words of Rose from The Titanic. About how she was standing in a crowded room and screaming but no one could hear, no one was paying her any attention. It was exactly how Louis felt, like he was screaming and screaming and screaming and management just shook their heads like he was a child throwing a tantrum and the rest of the world couldn’t hear. Harry could hear, Harry was screaming with him, louder than him, he was beating his fists against the wall and Harry wanted out, Harry wanted to tell the truth and shout their love from the rooftops because even after all this, he was still basically a kid, still naïve and unable to understand why loving Louis was a bad thing.

~

He was absolutely fucking done and mad energy sung in his veins. Management had flown Harry to Germany to be with Taylor. They'd fucking put him on a plane with a pat on the head and a ‘be good’, tearing him away from Louis and their home and everything that was right. Desperation fizzled in his fingertips and he wanted to fucking do something. Anything. 

Shaking fingers dialed Harry's number and it was a sickening simper that answered, all pretty and peachy and perfect and he wanted to rip Taylor's fucking throat out. 

"Harry can't come to the phone right now, sorry," she told him, giggling and preening and a furious haze clouded his vision because he knew exactly what she was trying to imply and it wasn't going to fucking work. 

"You absolute bitch." He told her politely, quietly, smiling through gritted teeth, not that she could see, and he put down the phone in a careful, measured way. 

A hundred wild scenarios flew through his head: getting on a plane to re-kidnap Harry back, calling Anne and crying and getting her on the warpath, dialing the number to a radio or TV station and making an announcement that would rock the nation. Despite his dramatic tendencies, all he wanted was Harry in his arms and Taylor gone and Eleanor gone and the lies gone and there was no fucking way that was going to happen. It was too much.

~

"You've reached Sugarscape," a woman's voice told him and he held the phone tighter.

"Hello?" 

He said nothing. He breathed through his nose.

"Hello?" The woman repeated and he closed his eyes. He couldn't do it.

He supposed it said a lot about him, that they'd gone along with these plans and schemes and lies for so long, and even now, he couldn't say the truth. Even now, backed against a wall and a gun cocked in their faces, he couldn’t speak out. He wished he had the guts, the backbone, the fearlessness to do it. The selfishness.

But he was scared. Not only of management, but of public backlash, of the end of One Direction, of the other boys hating him through veneers of sad smiles, splitting up and failing solo careers. Of becoming whatever-happened-to’s and has-been’s and he wished he was selfish enough to make the call. And while he could think of nothing sweeter than kissing Harry in public, Taylor's pretty, evil, blonde little face exposed for the sham she really was, he couldn't do it and he hung up the phone and he crawled to the bottom of a bottle of Jack.

~

“You're a mess, Mr. Tomlinson."

He didn't argue. He sat in front of the sterile desk, head bowed and hands clenched tightly in his lap. They shook slightly. The woman in front of him, her dyed red hair pulled so tightly back it looked like it must have been hurting her pursed lips. 

"We cannot have you talking to fans stinking of booze."

He said nothing. He was beyond caring. The woman’s red nails tapped the desk angrily.

"Do you have any idea how this looks?"

Deep breath. Nothing. 

"For god’s sake, Mr. Tomlinson, acting like someone has died is achieving the exact opposite of what we wanted with this relationship."

His hands trembled. 

"Do you not care about this band? You do realize if you go down, we can replace you. But if you drag your," pause, "boyfriend down with you, you screw over this whole band."

White knuckles. 

"Mr. Tomlinson. We have tried to be agreeable. But if you don't pull your act together we will have to start hard lining with you."

Silence. 

“Are you understanding what I’m saying, Mr. Tomlinson?”

Nails dug into skin.

The woman stood up, her heels clacking fussily.

"These are the non-negotiables. You will spend time with Eleanor. Harry will date Taylor Swift. You will look happy about this or you and this band will face serious consequences."

Gritted teeth. 

"Must I remind you that you have signed a contract?"

Closed eyes. 

"This is a legally binding agreement and you will do as we say."

Nothing. 

"Mr. Tomlinson, is this clear?"

Her voice was even sharper now, annoyed. Frustrated. 

He stood. 

“Can I go now?" He kept his voice down, controlled, only the slightest shake of rage. 

"We are watching you very carefully, Mr. Tomlinson. You are, at this point, a liability to this band." 

A parting blow. A last shot. A kick while he was down. 

He nodded sharply. 

"Understood." He snapped, before turning on his heel and striding angrily out of the room. The woman watched him go. He slammed the glass door. She didn't flinch.

~

The oblivion of alcohol called to him, but someone had swept their flat, nothing harder than soda left. The intrusion had his hands shaking and skin itching and he yelled out loud, feeling pushed and prodded and like he could snap. It was fucking ridiculous, invading their privacy, controlling their lives, even down to what they could or couldn’t drink and Louis was blinded and sickened and his heart felt too big in his chest.

He called Zayn. Zayn might not have understood completely, he might not have gotten it and how it feet but he could be sympathetic and he could bring straights and he could drink and Louis could feel slightly less alone. 

~

He'd been sneaking around. It was wrong and he knew it, but he just couldn't take anything anymore. He needed to get away, needed some kind of escape. Every eye was on him, they were all people talked about, and he couldn't take it. He needed an escape. It wasn't hard; Niall always had some type of alcohol with him and when he didn't, he'd go get some for Louis. Louis didn't care what it was; it could be vodka or tequila or beer or a fucking piña colada for all he gave a fuck. He just wanted the blur, the haze that settled over him, the break between him and reality. He didn't leave his flat. Harry never came home. Louis would fall asleep to drunken tears and wake up to hungover ones. Alone. Always alone.

~

Nobody was around. 

Louis snapped. 

He didn't really  _know_ what he was doing when it happened, really. One moment he was nursing a hangover, curled up in the window seat in their room. His room now. Harry never came around anymore. The next moment was glass shattering, a ripping scream, and his fist was bleeding, just bleeding and bleeding and the wind was cold on his face and blowing rain into his mouth and matting his fringe down onto his forehead. He just closed his eyes, let it bleed, let his life spill out over his fist and drip onto his sweats and the hardwood floor, let the rain slick him cold and wash away everything, baring him, cleansing him, laying him out naked until there was nothing left. And once he was done, he changed his trousers, wrapped a towel around his hand, and drove himself to the emergency room.

As he sat in the hospital, as they picked the glass from his skin and stitched up his knuckles, he realized it didn’t hurt. It didn’t hurt at all, hadn’t hurt in the first place. He just felt relieved, cold, tired, numb.

~

“Louis, what were you thinking?”

Louis had expected to be chewed out, really, he had. But he hadn’t expected it to be by  _Simon,_  of all people. Simon was busy, he had X Factor USA to run and bands to manage and, well, he had to be Simon fucking Cowell. Louis had expected to be sat in another grey office in an uncomfortable stiff chair with an even more uncomfortable stiff woman standing before him, tiny droplets of spit flying from her lips and landing on his face. But Simon, Uncle Simon, standing before him with a creased brow, hand pressed to his forehead, stress lines poking in.

“Louis, please answer me,” Simon commanded. And when Simon asked for something, you did it. “What’s happening to you? You’re drinking and you’re losing your mind, Louis, this isn’t the boy I know.”

Louis swallowed, shook his head. No answer.

“Louis, please. Talk to me.”

For a single shining moment he considered telling Simon. Letting it out, giving all this pain to someone else, someone in charge and he thought, just maybe, that Simon could fix something, could change something. He’d never seemed intolerant during X Factor, more like an indulgent uncle or family friend, smiling fondly at the boys’ antics. It burned, how much Louis wanted Simon to know, to stop dealing with this himself and with Harry, to let an adult take it and fix it and he opened his mouth to let it spill out. But he couldn’t, and he didn’t. Because he wasn’t selfish enough, and it was going to kill him.

Because how could he? How could Louis tell Simon that the company  _he_ founded, the thing he gained nearly all his money from, the management that held  _his_  band together and made him  _his_ cash and  _his_ everything, and the management company that paid  _Louis,_ that paid all of them... How could Louis tell him that it was ruining his life, making it worse, tearing him to shreds? Pulling down on him, pulling and just listening and laughing as he screamed and pulled and scratched at the concrete walls till his nails were filed down and bleeding, screamed till his throat was raw, shackled his ankles and chained him to a wall and shoved him back and made him fall and hurt him and kicked him while he was down. How could he tell Simon that?

He couldn’t.

He got up, shaking his head, pushing his chair in, walking, slowly, so slowly. Ignoring Simon’s calls behind him, walking until he was standing outside of the building, walking to his car and slowly opening the door and slamming it closed and starting the ignition and driving. He drove until he got home, the home he once shared with Harry and now only shared with alcohol and tears and pain and stupid memories of when they were  _happy,_ and once he got there he unlocked the door with his bandaged hand and didn’t even make it to the living room, just collapsed behind the front door, closed behind him, dropping his face into his hands and sobbing, heaving and shaking and shuddering until he had nothing left in him. And then he curled up on the doormat, right there, and closed his eyes, and kind of maybe hoped that he wouldn’t open them again.

~

A key turned in the lock and Louis' bloodshot eyes flicked up, barely daring to hope and finally, Harry was home. For once he walked in without a cheeky grin or a sarcastic hello and the light was gone from his eyes and Louis hated everything. There was no running, no jumping, no kissing and romantic hellos. Harry shuffled in the door, slow and painful and Louis grabbed him up in his arms. Harry sunk into the embrace, broken, and Louis held on, clutching Harry and the pieces of his heart together. He felt like if he let go everything would come pouring out; his heart, his guts, his blood, staining the floor and so he held Harry close, tight, holding himself together and Harry understood. They said nothing. They just held each other in the doorway, hating everything and this whole situation, both a little bit more broken and both a little bit more tired and both a little bit more confused and so much more unsure if anything was worth this pain.

~

Hiatus is such a pretty word. It sounds so nice, printed on a page, said in a worthless video, sent across the internet, typed onto a Tweet. It made it sound like maybe, just maybe, this mess of a boyband would come back, fix what they had fucked up, come back together and play one last tour, make one last album, a second try, on their second bat out of three. Hiatus sounded like a small break, like a vacation. It certainly didn’t sound like a certain boy had broken, just barely an adult, left with the entire world on his shoulders and the smallest gust of wind would tip him over. It didn’t sound like he had pulled down the one and only person he loved with him, a pure, innocent boy who didn’t even  _know_ the world was bad, a kid who was shoved into this purely out of love, who thought he was doing good. It didn’t sound like they had broken off, dropped off, left, refused to answer phone calls or do anything but murmur to each other and hold each other and tell the world to fuck off. It didn’t sound like they were trying to piece each other together, like they were failing miserably, slipping deeper, trying and trying to make it better but just not.

Hiatus didn’t express the other three boys, the blonde one with the big heart who just didn’t know what to do, who escaped back home with his mum and his dad and his brother and just stayed there, getting away from the big bad world, retreating back to the bedroom where he was just the guy with the guitar and the voice, not the one in the famous boyband, certainly not him. The one with the dark hair, dark eyes, dark everything, who just  _understood_ but  _didn’t,_  all at the same time, who tried for days and weeks and months and so, so long to help but couldn’t, constantly being pushed away and shoved back and told he was a pain and told he was in the way and told to just stop trying, the one who submitted to a career he loved and then hated before never being heard from again. And the one with the big caramel eyes, the not-so-innocent one, the one that just wanted to keep them all together but was breaking himself by worrying about it, complaining, thinking too hard, wanting star treatment when he was really just another kid. Just all of them, really. Just  _kids,_  kids with a dream who never,  _ever_ knew it would be like this.

Hiatus was really a pretty word. But, some words are stronger than others, and  _gone forever_ were stronger than hiatus, and suddenly, five boys were never the same, just because two had fallen in love, and even though it was okay, nobody thought it was, and suddenly, it wasn’t. 

 


End file.
